Mom Swears `Dead' Dog Bit Her Child

After Another Child's Bites Sparked A Legal Fracas, The Dog's Owner Said Zeus Died. Neighbors Disagree.

February 6, 2002|By Rene Stutzman, Sentinel Staff Writer

Dead dog bites 7-year-old boy in Casselberry.

Can this be true?

Kurt Spath insists his Rottweiler, Zeus, died last summer, shortly before animal-control officers planned to euthanize the dog. But that was five months before his neighbor, Laurie Killoran, says her son Shannon came home crying with three teeth marks on his face.

Laurie Killoran said in a complaint that Shannon was riding his bicycle Jan. 15 when he stopped at Spath's back yard. Shannon started playing fetch with Spath's 120-pound dog while his owner looked on, according to the mother.

"After approximately 10 throws, Shannon was done. Evidently Zeus was not because he came back and bit Shannon around his right eye," said his mother, who would not comment on the matter Tuesday.

If the Killorans are right, this is the second child Zeus has bitten in nine months. The first was Sydney Montalvo, 5, the granddaughter of a neighbor who was injured April 13 and needed 25 stitches to close the wounds on her face.

In November, Spath agreed to pay her family $25,000 to settle a lawsuit.

Sydney's wounds set off a fight between Spath and Seminole County Animal Control. After Spath refused several times to surrender the dog so the department could quarantine it, the county's animal-control board voted 3-2 in May for euthanasia.

Spath responded by filing a suit in U.S. District Court, charging that the county had violated his constitutional rights. U.S. District Judge Anne Conway in August disagreed.

When animal-control officers tried to pick up the dog Aug. 31, Spath told them Zeus had died, court records said.

He said the same thing Tuesday. "He passed away one morning," said Spath, adding that the cause was probably an ear infection. "I buried him at sea. Took a boat out from New Smyrna. He just loved the ocean."

Two weeks ago, animal-control officers went back to Spath's house because of the new report of a dog bite, but Spath again turned them away, according to a statement by Carole Jemison, one of the animal-control officers.